"And if I don't?"
"I fear you will rue it."
"Well, this looks more civilized!" said Helen, after they went down. "What nice antique furniture! how delightful those geraniums are; and how charming the fire looks and feels!"
"Here is your breakfast, dear Helen; eat it while it is warm," said May, coming in with a small tray, which she arranged on a stand behind her.
"Thank you, dear little lady; really this coffee is delicious, and the toast is very nice," said Helen, eating her breakfast with great goût.
"I am glad you relish it; and now that you are comfortably fixed, if you will excuse me, I will run out for an hour or so; I have some little matters to attend to down street. You will find a small bamboo tub in the next room, when you finish eating, in which you can wash up your cup and saucer, and plate."
"Yes, dame Trot, I will endeavor to do so!" said Helen, with a droll grimace.
"The tea-towel is folded up on the first shelf in that closet near you; so, good morning," said May, laughing, as she took up her work-basket, and went upstairs to get her bonnet and wrappings, and make other arrangements; then drawing on her walking-boots, and twisting a nubae around her throat, she went out, with a bundle in her hand, and walked with a brisk pace down the street. She soon approached a gothic church—a church of the Liguorian Missions, and at the distance of half a square, heard the solemn and heavenly appeals of the organ, rolling in soft aerial billows past her. She quickened her steps, and pushing gently against the massive door, went in. A solemn mass was being offered, and a requiem chanted, for the repose of the soul of a member of the arch-confraternity of the Immaculate Heart of MARY. "I thank thee, dear Jesus, for giving me this opportunity to adore thee," whispered May, kneeling in the crowd, "for all thy tender mercies, this is the most touching and consoling to me; when thou dost come, clad in the solemn and touching robes of propitiation, to offer THYSELF for the eternal repose of the souls of thy departed children."
The crowd increasing, and finding it impossible to penetrate through the masses in the aisle, she quietly edged her way along, until she came to the steps leading to the side gallery, which she ascended, and happily obtained a place where she had a full view of all that was passing below. On a plain catafalque, covered with black velvet, in front of the sanctuary and altar, rested a coffin. It was made of pine, and painted white. A few white lilies and evergreens were scattered among the lights which burned around it; and May knew that some young virgin had gone to her espousals in the kingdom of the LAMB. Half of the coffin-lid was turned back, and as she looked more attentively on the marble features, turned to strange and marvellous beauty by the great mystery—death—she recognized them. They belonged to a poor crippled girl, who had suffered from her childhood with an incurable disease, and who had been almost dependent on the alms of the faithful for her daily support.
"What a change for thee, poor Magdalen!" whispered May, as she gazed down through her tears. "I look on the pale vestment of clay in which you suffered, and know that for you the awful mystery is solved. Thorns no more wound your heart; poverty and disease have done their worst; while far up, beyond the power of earth and evil, your destiny is accomplished. A poor mendicant no longer, the King of glory himself ushered you into the unrevealed splendors of that region which mortal eye hath never seen. You have beheld the glorious face of the sacred humanity of Jesus Christ; your eyes have seen the Queen of heaven; and the veiled vision of the Eternal Father has greeted you. Oh, what cheer! Oh, what hope, to make joyful the purifying sufferings of purgatory! and now, on your altar, Jesus, the high-priest and powerful Lord, full of clement mercy and majestic power, offers himself for thy speedy liberation and admission into the beatific vision. Oh, Magdalen! how art thou exalted! how beyond all imperial splendor and royal power art thou lifted up!"